By
Steve Buttry
If
you’re a journalist who has benefited from the multiple layers of editing that
newsrooms traditionally had, you need to take more responsibility for the
quality of your content.
If
you’re tweeting or blogging, you probably already are publishing content
unedited (and probably have suffered the embarrassment of some errors a copy
editor would have caught).
If
we work out our editing systems right, we will give most non-live content at
least one edit before publication, maybe more. But the inescapable fact is that
your copy is going to get less editing than you’re used to. So you need to be a
better self-editor. Below are some tips. These might also be helpful for
assigning editors who need to become better copy editors.
Master
SEO headlines
You
may be writing your own blog headlines. You should be suggesting you’re own
headlines for stories that you turn in. Writing headlines also helps you
determine whether your story is well-focused. If you can’t write a good
headline, maybe you should work a bit more to get to the point of the story.
Make
one last read through your copy. Once you think you’re done, whether you’re
writing a tweet or an investigative project, read it through yourself, not for
rewriting or fact-checking (this comes after fact-checking).
This final read is
just for clarity, voice, spelling and grammar. For instance, in reading through
this blog post before publication, I caught the "you’re" in the
paragraph above that should be "your." I left it in to make this
point. It was too good to fix in that particular spot.
Read
aloud
I
once wrote in a story about a drought that the city was encouraging water
consumption, when I meant water conservation. I am sure I didn’t read that
drought story aloud. Conservation and consumption may look a lot alike, but
that’s the kind of error that jumps out when you read your work aloud.
Use
an accuracy checklist.
You
are responsible for the accuracy of your content. Use a checklist to make sure everything is accurate.
Improve
your grammar and word usage
Schools
don’t teach grammar as well as they used to, so even the smart students with
strong writing skills who go into journalism often have weaknesses in grammar,
spelling and word usage.
Yes, it’s better to learn these matters in your youth,
but you can still improve as a professional. I have blogged on some grammar matters that confuse many journalists, and the American Copy Editors Society
has lots of resources
to help with grammar and word usage.
Use
spellcheck (but don’t rely on it)
There
is no excuse for failing to catch errors that your computer can point out to
you. But don’t routinely change potential errors highlighted by your computer
(some of them are right). And don’t make the computer your only spellcheck. Use
the dictionary to check the spelling (and usage) of words you aren’t sure
about.
Make
every word count.
I
blogged last year with advice for writing tight copy. By planning to write
tight, setting a brisk pace and being demanding in your rewrite, you can turn
in cleaner copy.
These
tips are excerpted from a post on The Buttry Diary and published on IJNet with the author’s
permission.
Steve Buttry is
digital transformation editor for Digital First Media.
Image
CC-licensed on Flickr via unclesond.
Source: http://ijnet.org/blog
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